


a chorus so sublime

by troiing



Series: S for Sanctuary [1]
Category: Sanctuary (TV), V for Vendetta - All Media Types
Genre: Crossover, Crossover Pairings, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-10
Updated: 2014-03-10
Packaged: 2018-01-15 06:22:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1294690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/troiing/pseuds/troiing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pragmatic and sympathetic, Helen affords V a pleasure he's not, to his memory, had the luxury of experiencing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a chorus so sublime

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FoxLight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FoxLight/gifts).



She’s fascinated by his senses: the way he can hit a target that was behind his back from fifteen, twenty feet away, dead center with his blades, every time; the sensitivity of his hearing; his vision, mask and all; his dexterity and reflexes. For all that he’s covered in those terrible scars, it’s as if the fire didn’t touch him—didn’t do anything but permanently mar his skin itself—not the nerves or anything else of the man beneath.

But he’s hinted at things that happened before that fire, and she has her suspicions regarding them. His abnormalities are enviable, but their limits are equally fascinating.

She’s wondered, briefly, if he’s capable of achieving the end she’s suspected he craved at times, mostly after first meeting him. Imagines that the lack of healing ability—the ability, simply, to _survive_ —as though she’d injected the source blood thirty, forty years later in life. Condemned to a life of perpetual old age. Worse, though; condemned to bear every scar, but never to die.

“Gloves.”

He’s without them as frequently as he wears them now; she doesn’t mind the appearance of his hands, and he’ll confess, functioning without them is much easier. He doesn’t delay, but removes them and lays them together on the dresser.

“Belt.”

This, he removes with hesitation, and she takes it from him before he can perform the same careful placement; drops it to the floor instead. This is not the every day; everything no longer has a designated place.

“Mask.”

“No.”

She’s seen him without it, but now, he’s unwilling. Not this time. Next time, perhaps. If there is a next time. If _this time_ is finished out. The tone of his voice makes her move closer to him, but she doesn’t push. She presses her forehead against the brow of the mask and says quietly: “If you’re not comfortable…”

“I am not. But I’m not certain that what I feel is discomfort, either.”

She touches his hand, eases her fingers along his. Trails her fingertips to his knuckles, and closes her hand around the outside of his marred palm before bringing his hand to her chest. “My shirt.”

The female form is no mystery to him; he’s spent most of the life he can remember in an art museum, after all. But his pulse and breath quicken, and Helen too is aware: he’s never been _with_ a woman. Not that he remembers. He can hardly remember smooth, unmarred skin beneath his naked flesh, before Helen had slipped her hand into his gloveless one and pressed his palm against her cheek so many weeks ago.

She wants him to feel this. Of course, she’s not so selfless to have offered, if she didn’t want it too.

It goes like this—quiet invitations to action until she presses in upon him, guiding him down to the bed with her body. She’s naked; he remains fully clothed. Next time, perhaps, she’ll feel the rough and ruined thighs against her own (again, if there is another), but now she looses his trousers and slips her hand against his body and locks the fingers of the other over his own, encouraging him with the touch and a mere look to explore her body, beginning with the smooth, white breasts.

He gasps from within the mask, and she can’t help the curl of her lips, or the warmth she feels rising within her.

“You find me humorous?”

“I find you endearing,” she replies, tracing circles across his broad shoulders with her palms before pausing to grip his arms. His hands are rough, but his touch is careful; she could almost take him in.

“I don’t believe anyone’s ever called me that.”

“Mask?” It’s not a battle; it’s an offer he rejects again.

She’s beginning to wonder what she’ll do with her lips, but a compromise for the sake of his comfort hardly hurts her feelings. In the meantime, his hands search her ribs, and she guides him into her with a noise of pleasure that makes him squeeze her side in surprise.

“Helen…”

“It’s fine.”

“How—?”

“Are you enjoying yourself?”

“Immensely.”

“Then don’t worry about me,” she soothes, rocking her hips easily into him. “You’ll know if I’m uncomfortable.” And then, although they’ve discussed all this, she asks: “You’ll let me know if you feel it’s too much?”

“Of course.”

“Wig?”

A beat—thoughtful, as well as overwhelmed. “Yes.”

She’s careful with this: lays it to the side and rests a hand on the back of his head. Better, she thinks as her hips fall against his again, and again, his hands back to favoring the weight of her breasts.

He’s fast—too fast, with his breath all ragged and his fingers driving into her thighs—for Helen to come close, but she rides him out and patiently eases away. For all the aftermath, he understands: shaking, releases her legs with an apologetic stroke to soothe away the splotches where his fingers had been, then withdraws again in recollection of his ruined and rough skin.

“Don’t,” she mumbles when he hesitates in his touch. “How are you?”

He’s still for a moment before easing his hands onto her waist again. “That was wonderful. But I fear you’ve done me a kindness I haven’t returned.”

“Would you like to return it?”

“I would. But I’m afraid—”

“Nothing to question, V; I’m quite easy to please,” she murmurs, easing the fingers of one hand through his before guiding them down between their bodies.

“No. No, absolutely not,” he says in a moment, taking his hand away from hers and releasing her body entirely.

It’s the full release that has her jaw dropping open a little. “V—”

“I’m sorry, Helen, I meant nothing—” He’s realized that she’s upset—insulted, even—and raises his arms in surrender. “These hands. Not these hands.”

And certainly, he feels her deflate over him. She laughs very quietly, a note, and he cants his head to the side as she reaches out in relief, taking both of his hands into her own. Before she can speak though, he interrupts again.

“I’d only hurt you, Helen. I couldn’t bear that. And besides, these hands have too much blood on them.”

She sobers at the last, but drops one of his hands in favor of resting an arm on his shoulder. “Do you suppose there’s no blood on my hands, V? I’m not so lily-white. And as for these hands—” the hand still in his shifts, pressing palm to palm, and her fingertips stroke his “—go gently. I believe they’ll provide more pleasure than you know.”

It’s true: when he’s slowly, but willingly lowered his hand again, his ragged fingertips against sensitive flesh make her bite down hard on her lip, stretching one arm out behind him and digging the fingers of the other into the fabric of his shirt. He’s dexterous and attentive: finds what she likes best and responds in kind.

“Easy,” she mumbles, and he withdraws in concern. “No, no. Make it last, if you don’t mind.”

“Ah,” he sighs, and she’s certain she detects relief and pleasure alike behind his voice. A man who likes to see his partner happy—good. Her lips quirk upward at him again as he adds: “Of course.”

It’s not as if pornography hasn’t been among the outlawed books, movies, and art he’s liberated from government control.

She’d take him for an outright tease, once he hears that request. A little noise escapes her, and he hums his approval. Once more, one more request: “Mask?”

“Do you not find me grotesque?” he asks in curiosity, pulling her close with his arm around the small of her back.

“You know I don’t.”

“Do your worst, then.”

“Not if you’re not comfortable with it.”

“My concern is mostly for you, Helen. You may remove it.”

He’s sincere. Being so close makes it easy to wrap her arms around him and tug gently at the ties of the mask. She tilts her head against his temple as she removes it, closing the space between their bodies for a moment. He hisses a breath at their nearness and with a strangled noise at the hook of his finger and the sound of his breath, she moves for his mouth.

His face hardly resembles a face, lips ragged and torn (she’d be lying if she doesn’t admit, she’s wondered how he enunciates so perfectly when he speaks), but after a moment of navigating his shock and his mouth itself, she’s determined how best to kiss him. She cuffs his ears, holds his head, jerks her hips against his hand when he strikes just right against her. “Mm, dear god,” she breathes against him. “ _Now_.”

He takes the request to heart, and in a moment, her whole body lurches against him and a strangled outcry leaves her lips.

He holds her obligingly until she’s done, and she can’t help but laugh a little, breathless. “That was good.”

“You found it enjoyable?” he questions, touching her side more hesitantly again.

“Very. And you?”

“Oh yes. Perhaps the second part more than the first. Thank you.” He pauses a moment as she leans lightly against him, lifting a hand to her face. “You’re a strange woman, Helen Magnus.”

“Do you think so?” she laughs. “You’re a special breed yourself.”

“Why? Because I find poetry in a shuddering breath? _’I brought allofher tremb-ling to a dead stand-still.’*_ Thrilling, I think.”

“Cummings, isn’t it?”

“I’d say I’m impressed, but you probably knew him.”

“I attended two of his Charles Eliot Norton Lectures.”

He looks away to laugh—she suspects out of concern for the appearance of his features in a smile. So she leans in to kiss his cheek, little more than a peck, before withdrawing for the mask. She replaces it for him. Leans to tie it behind his head, and comes away stroking the back of his neck, until the turtleneck blocks her fingers from his skin.

“Thank you, Helen,” he repeats after a moment, watching her from behind the mask as her lips curve into a warm smile. This is the smile he associates with joy: it bubbles into her eyes and makes his own mouth rise behind the mask.

“Of course. Anything else?”

“Anything else!” This time, V’s the one laughing. “Suffer to caress this demon and then ask if there’s anything else. _’How now. I hope thou art not mad?’**_ ”

She withdraws with another chuckle at that, removing herself from his lap and seeking out her clothes. He’s serious, but not entirely; she knows that, while he’s accepted that she doesn’t view him as such, he still sees a loathsome creature in the mirror. “There’s a beauty to you, V.”

“A beauty to everyone, no? But no compare to those expanses of marble flesh.”

“Would you like to touch again?”

“I would not overstep the bounds of our friendship.”

“No bounds, so long as the intent is clear, yes?”

“Mad witch, I’ll find a Venus to admire.”

She laughs again, more brightly than before. “So long as I’m not her.”

“I’m convinced there is no Venus, nor Aphrodite.”

“Why is that?”

“Did she exist, Zeus would have married her off to this Hephaestus long ago!”

“Someone far more terrible likely has her as his prize. He’s riding back to Olympus now, drunk on Dionysus’ wine.”

“My god, to have such educated company!”

Her grin is winning, but in a moment, she sobers just enough for sincerity. “I should thank you as well, V. I did enjoy that.”

“I’m glad,” he says, and she thinks she can hear the smile in his voice.

**Author's Note:**

> *E. E. Cummings, "she being Brand"  
>  _i... brought allofher tremB-ling to a:dead. stand-;Still_  
>  **Shakespeare, "The Taming of the Shrew"  
>  _Why, how now, Kate, I hope thou art not mad!_


End file.
